Fascinating Egypt

It was a great learning experience & a pleasure to be part of the invited International Faculty for the second Alexandria Forum for Women's Health & Development organized by the Suzanne Mubarak Regional Centre for Women's Health & Development (SMC) under the guidance of Prof Hassan Sallam assisted ably by Dr Samir Ashraf. This Center is situated in what was the royal quarter of ancient Alexandria where the famous Library, Museum & University once stood. Two thousand years ago, Alexandria possessed a famous medical school, where Herophilus, the father of Anatomy, was the first to perform systematic dissection of the human body and where Erasistratos was the first to use the term "pathology" to describe the diseased organs. it was in Alexandria during these days that Soranus, the famous gynecologist made the first drawing of the human uterus, and where famous physicians of the classical world, trained before practicing medicine on the various shores of the Mediterranean. Indeed, Galen himself, who came originally from Pergamon spent a few years in alexandria before traveling to Rome and becoming the personal physician of Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his son Commodus. Two thousand years later, the Center conceptualized by Suzanne Mubarak, the first lady of Egypt felicitated one of the two pioneers of modern day IVF - Professor Robert Edwards. It was a pleasure hearing him speak & getting nuggets of his personal life - which is a must read inspirational story for everyone.
Besides, the excellent academic program, the hosts went over-board in personally looking after all the invited speakers - they were given a private tour of the SMC & of Alexandria. We were all put up in the scenic hotel Helnan Palestine overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. I met my old friend Prof Osama Shawki at the meeting & at the end of a long and tiring day, he invited me with his group to one of the best seafood Restaurants in all of Egypt - The Seagull. Our group comprised of the illustrious gynecologist of the first-families in Egypt - Prof Sameh Zaki and his wife Dr Sanaa Asaad , their lovely daughter Noha, Prof Nabil Abdel Hakeem and his wife Dr Rawia Ezaat, Dr Omayma Edrees, Prof Osama Shawki & his lovely better half Gigi and Yehia and Youssef - their handsome sons.
This was an experience for me - I have eaten all across the globe in the best seafood restaurants & the Seagull could give a run for the money to the best of the rest! Fresh catch-of-the-day was chosen by the hosts & grilled to perfection. The seafood was served with traditional appetizers like Tahina, egyptian cheese paste, spicy Aubergine paste & fresh oven-baked Egyptian bread. The ambience in this restaurant (owned & run by an Egyptian man & his German wife) was something from the 1950's & 1960's. There were statues, paintings, handicraft pieces and tropical birds and animals forming part of the environment. i saw hens with plumes of their feet and paws (hybrids) and tiny cross-bred murses (mules crossed with horses) who were giving the tiny-tots rides in the verandah.
My friend Osama outdid the hospitality this time around & the entire group celebrated the meeting of old friends in the Paris of the East!

Holi- The Festival of Colors

I received this bulk-mail from Lucknow. I thought it embodied the spirit of India & Holi and wanted to share it with our blogeurs. I'm sure you will love the accompanying pictures including the Holi bonfire from the previous night!

"Dear Friends,

Phalgun has arrived with the promise of warm days and new life – Spring, the season of rejuvenation and rebirth. The earth discards its winter gloom and begins to blossom again under the fresh blue of the March skies. As if to mark this change, Holi flings colour into Indian landscape and invites the celebration of life.

The spirit of Holi is colour - rich and vibrant, flung into the air and smeared with laughter of friends and loved ones. It recalls the secret of life: a shifting panorama of sights, movements and feelings. Colours denote energy - the vivid, passionate pulse of life. Colour signifies the vitality that makes the human race unique in the universal scheme. Colours represent diversity that is so uniquely Indian!

I have heard from my mother that when they were children the colour for Holi was made at home, from the flowers of the 'tesu' tree also called 'the flame of the forest' or 'palash'. The flowers, bright red in colour were collected from the trees and spread out on mats, to dry in the sun. Once dried, they were then ground to a fine powder. This powder was then mixed with water to give a rich saffron-red colour. The mixture was considered good for health, probably because of the reddish glow it left behind on the skin.

‘Gujia’ is another Holi speciality to which we look forward to all the year. This unique delicacy, with a crispy cover and a sweet core of khoya, kaju, badam, pista, kesar and kish-mish invariably breaks through all our weight loss resolutions and leaves us wanting for just one more!

Here is wishing you all a very joyous Holi! Please do convey our love to the children in your family and vicinity and please do not even glance at the bathroom scale for the next seven days!

‘Phoolon ne khushboo ka jam bheja hai
Taaron ne aasman se salam bheja hai
Khushion aur rangon se bhari ho Holi
Dil se humne ye paigam bheja hai’

Regards,

Surajit Bhattacharya"

Sandwich Art

The effects of climate change can no longer be ignored

Parents today

Hi Friends, Im at the airport enroute to Alexandria for the 2nd Annual Suzanne Mubarak 30 Years of IVF Congress. Don't feel like putting up an academic blog. So enjoy this cute socker:)

The Pacemaker Hacking Prelude

A group of researchers from the Medical Device Security Center (who would've thought we needed one of those?) have demonstrated wireless vulnerabilities in some cardiac monitor-pacemakers that may allow someone to remotely deactivate them while they're implanted in a patient. Now that's what I call malicious.

Properly called "implantable cardiac defibrillators," the devices are used to keep people's dicky tickers beating regularly, acting to speed them up if too slow or shock a heart that is beating too fast. Modern ones have wireless functions so that doctors can reprogram them to suit a patient's condition, and that's the problem, since these signals are unencrypted.

That means you could potentially intercept them, and use the data to transmit signals that would turn off the device or even deliver shocks that could trigger a heart attack.

Pacemaker wearers need not panic, though, freaky as this sounds: you'd have to be very close to someone to perform an attack, and the kit the science team used cost a chunky $30,000. Phew.

Viagra could harm sperm and reduce fertility

Two new studies have identified factors that could be causing a decline in male fertility. Research published in the journal Fertility and Sterility on the anti-impotence drug Viagra concluded that men taking the drug could be damaging their sperm and lowering their ability to conceive. Another study, published in the environmental journal the Ends Report, suggests that pollution from chemicals such as dioxin can lower a man's sperm count.
The first study, led by Dr David Glenn at Queen's University Belfast, , treated sperm in vitro with Viagra, and found treated sperm to be more active than untreated sperm, but also that the 'acrosome', which produces enzymes that help the sperm penetrate the egg, was damaged by the drug. Tests in mice showed that sperm treated with Viagra produced 40 per cent
less embryos than untreated. Dr Glenn is concerned that the drug is being prescribed to couples seeking help for fertility problems, and says that 'giving male partners something that could make the problem worse is scarcely the right approach'. He has also raised issues with younger males using the drug recreationally, who may be harming their chances of starting
a family in the future. The second study identified another factor thought to influence male fertility rates: pollution from chemicals such as dioxin, released through industrial processes and found in the atmosphere. A chemical explosion in
Italy in 1976 exposed people to a cloud of highly toxic dioxin. A study 22 years later of male volunteers who were exposed found that men who were aged under nine at the time of the explosion had 43 per cent lower sperm counts than a control group. Men who were aged between ten and 17 when exposed, however, had sperm counts 62 per cent higher, and men who were over 17 were unaffected. The findings suggest that dioxin is a potential factor responsible for falling sperm counts, and also puts a question mark over other industrial chemicals.
Endocrine-disrupting chemicals are also thought to be affecting fertility rates. Three such chemicals have been investigated by scientists at the National Food Institute, Technical University of Denmark. When the chemicals were administered separately, they were harmless. Concurrent exposure, however, resulted in malformed sexual organs in the fetuses, showing potential cocktail effects of chemicals should be taken into account when investigating their effects on fertility rates. In Denmark, just under five per cent of boys are born with a certain malformation of their sexual organs. Meanwhile, new hope was given to infertile couples in Australia, where Menevit, the 'first ever drug to for male infertility', has been developed. It contains antioxidants and works by acting on free radicals that fragment sperm, the main cause of infertility. In a preliminary study of 60 infertile men, the rate of pregnancy was increased significantly, but larger clinical trials are required before the drug can be merited.